Donald Trump made one ridiculous claim after another about his relationship with Michael Cohen during an interview today. Lickspittle host Harris Faulkner barely challenged a word.

Faulkner, who is supposedly one of Fox’s serious news people, asked Trump why “criminal liar” Michael Cohen was in Trump’s inner circle.

“Yeah, well it happens,” Trump said, as if it was no biggie that the Commander in Chief didn’t notice until recently that a guy who worked for him since 2007 is a nogoodnik. “Look, it happens. I hire usually good people. But it just happened.”

Actually, Cohen is just one of many Trump hires who turned out not to be "only the best." Or a felon. Of course, Faulkner did not point that out. “Why did you need him?” she asked, as a chummy follow up.

TRUMP: First of all, very low level-work. He did more public relations than he did law. But he did – you’d see him on television, he was OK on television. But years ago – many years ago, like 12, 13 years ago, he did me a favor. He was on a committee and he was so responsive and so good and I said, “He’s a nice guy.”

FAULKNER: Wait a minute, wait a minute. That was the favor? … People have been asking, what is the favor that he did the president?

Wait a minute! That was her “challenge?” As CNN’s Chris Cilizza noted, it's obvious Cohen did more than “very low-level work” given that he was in charge of payoffs to two women alleging extramarital affairs with Trump. And he got that responsibility because he did a favor for Trump nine years earlier and “was OK on television?”

If any of that occurred to Faulkner, she kept it to herself. She let Trump continue with his story that only the most die-hard Trump fans could swallow.

TRUMP: [Cohen] was on a committee, it was a condominium committee, many years ago and he was a very big supporter of mine on that committee. I did a great job, Trump World Tower, it’s a very tall building right opposite the United Nations. And when you build a building, people always get together at the end and they make a settlement with the owner. They say the ceiling wasn’t painted the right color or something.

FAULKNER: Mmhmm.

TRUMP: Sometimes serious stuff but in my case it was a great building. And he was on the committee. I thought he was a great guy. I thought he was really a nice guy. He was always supportive. And I liked him. And he was a lawyer. And because of that, I did it. And you know what? In retrospect, I made a mistake. Because what he did was all unrelated to me except for the two campaign finance charges that are not criminal and shouldn’t have been on there. They put that on there to embarrass me. They put those two charges on to embarrass me. They’re not criminal charges.

No, they’re not criminal charges against Trump (yet) but they are federal crimes, not civil matters he has been implicated in.

But Faulkner replied to all this nonsense by agreeing with Trump. “And I’ve interviewed people who’ve told me this,” she concurred.

TRUMP: So what happened is that either Cohen or the prosecutors, in order to embarrass me, said, listen, I’m making this deal, for reduced time and everything else – do me a favor, put these two charges on.

Trump just made serious allegations against federal prosecutors and a judge who had sentenced Cohen yesterday, without any evidence. Faulkner’s response? She said she wanted to “move on,” then lobbed a softball: “Michael Cohen says that he lied in order to protect you. What’s your response to that?”

TRUMP: Let me tell you, I never directed him to do anything wrong. Whatever he did, he did on his own. He’s a lawyer. A lawyer who represents a client is supposed to do the right thing. That’s why you pay them a lot of money, etcetera, etcetera. He is a lawyer. He represents a client. I never directed him to do anything incorrect or wrong and he understand that. Look, he did some bad things, unrelated to me. Maybe related to his other clients. … What he did is he made a deal in order to embarrass me. In order to embarrass me, they cut his term down. Pretty terrible stuff.

So now "low-level" Cohen did act as a lawyer for Trump and took care of legal matters behind his back? Faulkner didn't have a word to say about that.

Watch it below, from the December 13, 2018 Outnumbered Overtime. I’ll have more on this interview in my next post.